okay i bought 3 peppermint shirimp from capicino bay on sat to help with my aiptasia problem. i can not find one of the shrimp but the other two are hinding behind the powerheads. and they still have not eaten the aipasia should i just give them time to come down and get used to the tank.?

flyingarmy

12-26-2007, 2:48 PM

It's hit or miss with Peppermint shrimp on even if they will eat aiptasia. Give them some time and depending on how you feed your tank and if they like the taste of aiptasia you will know. Good luck!

oceanreefer124

12-26-2007, 2:53 PM

MIne never ate. I ended up buying Joes Juice.

jade76

12-26-2007, 3:06 PM

Mine never ate apitasia....however instead of joes juice lemon juice can be substituted to inject with. A much cheaper fix with the same results...just dont overdue it as it can affect your ph.

Soarin'

12-26-2007, 4:35 PM

Peppermint shrimp are also supposed to eat bristleworms too, but mine never did. They are also supposed to eat baby zoanthids too, and I was worried about it because I found this out after I bought two, but mine never did.

I think the difference is between aquacultured peppermints and wild-caught ones. The aquacultured peppermints probably never see aptaisia, so they never learn that it is "food", unless their instincts kick in.

Anyone around here know how what the percentage is between wild-caught and aquacultured pepps for sale at the LFS?

I put some lemon juice on the rock with my two aptaisia (even before I got the peppermint shrimp) and that killed it dead, never to return. I poured some salt on it too for good measure.

I read that you can get a needle from the pharmacist and inject the lemon juice into the aiptasia, and kill it that way. Any lemon juice that gets away will be quickly neutralised by your tank's buffering capacity and not harm even critters right next to it, which was shown by pictures of people who did that to aiptasia that was growing on next to their expensive coral.

tim8111

12-26-2007, 7:48 PM

Anyone around here know how what the percentage is between wild-caught and aquacultured pepps for sale at the LFS?

I don't know about others, but my peppermint are all wild caught. The supplier I use goes out and collects them and almost all the items they sale. Matter of fact, I had a glass anemone growing on a montipora frag disk, I set it in the compartment with 30 peppermints, it was an interesting sight to see the 5 largest pushing each other of the frag disk to get at the glass anemone. :) I should have taped it.

Victor626nj

12-26-2007, 7:52 PM

there actually two kinds from diffrent parts of the world one eats them the other doesnt ....i researched this with steven from fish buisness whrn i first got into the hobbly but cant remember were they are from

sagent3000

12-26-2007, 8:12 PM

i bought them from cap bay

Amici

12-26-2007, 9:01 PM

Mine from Capp Bay were Fing devils. They DID NOT TOUCH my aiptasia and then they proceed to eat my Orange AND blue clove polyps the first night in there and then moved to my eagle eye zoas. The second I saw it pick at my zoas I tore the tank apart and he was voted off the island....

JetChris

12-26-2007, 9:41 PM

My peps ate all my aptasia. I got them from ??? i forget where??

FutureInterest

12-26-2007, 11:15 PM

There are indeed two types: Caribbean and Pacific peppermints. The Caribbean ones are the good ones that have a fairly good track record on eating aptasia. The pacific ones are pure evil imo. I get most of my inverts from Cap Bay and they carry mostly caribbean peppermints. One time though I got a pacific one from them and put it in the tank without examining it too carefully. Before I could get it out it had killed a rare ruby red BTA and a long tentacle plate coral. I still have a caribbean peppermint from cap bay in my display and he is a model citizen. Anyways, I tore down my rockwork to get that monster out and the nice people at CBA took him off my hands and even compensated me for my losses to some degree :).

Soarin'

12-27-2007, 12:58 AM

There are indeed two types: Caribbean and Pacific peppermints. The Caribbean ones are the good ones that have a fairly good track record on eating aptasia. The pacific ones are pure evil imo. [snip] One time though I got a pacific one from them and put it in the tank without examining it too carefully. Before I could get it out it had killed a rare ruby red BTA and a long tentacle plate coral. .

So how do you tell the two apart? I got one from the Aviarium and he too was a model citizen, and after he got used to the tank was a really cool addition.

So: Do the Caribbean ones eat Zoas and how do you tell the two kinds apart? The peppermint shrimp showed lots of personality and I would get another one if I knew it would be a good citizen and only eat aiptasia and not other corals. I don't have a problem with aiptasia so I wouldn't risk it unless I knew that I didn't have to wait up inspecting his late night snacking habits.

Seedless Reefer

12-27-2007, 6:34 PM

I had a nasty aptasia problem and I dumped about 5 peps in the tank and presto all gone.

kwajtrader

01-24-2009, 8:05 PM

I found this link that describes the difference between the two species. There is also a photo:

http://www.peteducation.com/article.cfm?c=16+2158+2221&aid=2123

From the link:
The Peppermint Shrimp, Lysmata wurdemanni, also known as the Veined Shrimp, or Caribbean Cleaner Shrimp, is part of the "cleaner" shrimp family, but is considered to be more of a scavenger. Its yellowish white body has several distinctive longitudinal red stripes. The Peppermint Shrimp is sometimes confused with its Pacific cousin, Rhynchocinetes durbanensis, which has a pointed nose and inter-spaced white stripes over its body.